Congressional recess gives LI delegation time to attack, and tout, Trump's big budget bill

WASHINGTON — The massive tax-and-spend bill signed into law by President Donald Trump will be at the top of the agenda as Long Island’s House members spend the five-week summer recess back in their districts, meeting with constituents, speaking to community groups and hosting events.

The midterm elections may be more than a year away, but the recent passage of the megabill is already providing both sides ammunition for the political battles ahead.

For Republican Reps. Andrew Garbarino (R-Bayport) and Nick LaLota (R-Amityville), the new law presents an opportunity to tout popular tax breaks, including a boost to the state and local tax (SALT) deduction cap. For Democratic Reps. Tom Suozzi (D-Glen Cove) and Laura Gillen (D-Rockville Centre), the bill provides an opportunity to spotlight the projected increase in uninsured New Yorkers stemming from cuts to Medicaid and the expiration of enhanced Affordable Care Act tax subsidies.

Which messages will resonate the most with voters remains to be seen on the suburban battleground of Long Island, where Trump carried both Nassau and Suffolk counties but Suozzi and Gillen won seats previously flipped by Republicans in 2022.

"It’s going to come down not only to the party brand, but to the ability of Republicans and Democrats to deliver a message that resonates with suburban swing voters, as well as their base," said Lawrence Levy, executive dean of the National Center for Suburban Studies at Hofstra University, in a phone interview.

Gillen and Suozzi are top targets among national Republicans eager to build off Trump’s victory. The National Republican Campaign Committee — the campaign arm of House Republicans — has listed both members among 26 House Democrats they plan to target in the upcoming election cycle.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has vowed to "make sure every battleground voter knows how vulnerable House Republicans abandoned them by passing" the bill.

Suozzi said in a phone interview that he believes most voters in his district are not judging the bill through a partisan lens but are "worried, and have questions." He said he plans to speak to community groups in his district that have invited him to appear and would like to host a town hall before the House returns for work on Sept. 2.

"The facts are going to speak for themselves — that this bill unnecessarily gives tax breaks to some of the wealthiest Americans, while cutting health care and food benefits for some of the neediest Americans," Suozzi said. "It’s going to cause health care premiums to go up for everybody, and it’s all happening while it’s going to create the biggest deficit in the history of the United States of America."

An analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released Monday projected an additional 10 million people will be left without health insurance in 2034 due in part to changes to Medicaid eligibility requirements, such as excluding some immigrant groups who were previously allowed to apply for coverage. The analysis estimated the bill will add $3.4 trillion to the national deficit from 2025 to 2034.

Touting savings

LaLota and Garbarino argue the changes to Medicaid eligibility requirements are meant to address "waste, fraud and abuse" in the system. Both are heavily touting their work negotiating an increase to the SALT deduction tax cap to $40,000 from a $10,000 cap first imposed under a Trump-backed tax bill passed by the Republican-majority Congress in 2017.

"After a hard-fought battle and months of negotiations, I’m proud to say that Republicans have quadrupled the SALT deduction cap," Garbarino said in a statement. 

Asked specifically about the concerns raised around Medicaid, Garbarino's office pointed to his July 2 statement following passage of the bill: "These targeted reforms are designed to protect benefits for those who truly need them while eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse that threaten the program long term."

LaLota in a statement to Newsday defended the new law, saying it "sells itself" as he pointed to reports that the series of tax cuts is expected to reduce federal tax bills for the average Long Islander.

On social media, LaLota has defended the changes to Medicaid eligibility, specifically requiring able-bodied adults between the ages of 19 and 64 to complete 80 hours of work or community service a month to qualify for benefits. A study by the health research organization KFF found nearly two-thirds of Medicaid recipients 64 and under were already employed. 

LaLota said the changes "promote self-sufficiency" and noted President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, supported work requirements under a welfare reform bill signed into law in 1996.

"It’s not punishment — it’s dignity," LaLota said in a post on X. 

Health access

Gillen, a freshman representative who is expected to hold an event about the new law in her district, said some of her biggest concerns center on the projected impacts to health care access.

"New Yorkers who purchase their insurance through the marketplaces are already being warned their premiums will jump," Gillen said in a statement to Newsday. "In the long term, health care experts warn that we will all be impacted: hospitals and nursing homes will raise prices, cut services or even close their doors as they anticipate a huge shortfall."

Hofstra's Levy pointed to polls that show the bill remains unpopular with a majority of Americans.

"Democrats definitely have the messaging momentum, the grist for the political mill, with a potential to move voters," he told Newsday in a phone interview.

But he also noted that Republicans "have been very adept" at spotlighting more popular elements of the bill, like tax breaks and a surge in border security funding, "to mount a counter-offensive and change what is now a negative narrative."

A Siena College poll of state voters released July 2, before Trump signed what he calls the "Big, Beautiful Bill" into law, found 52% of respondents believe the bill "will worsen, not improve, life for a majority of Americans," compared with 28% who believe the bill will "improve" life. Among the critical swing group of self-described independent voters, 49% said they believed the bill would worsen conditions.

As Republicans look to talk up the new law, they must grapple with getting their message across at a time when much of Trump's base is consumed with calls to release all files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a financier with former ties to Trump, who died in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.

"It can easily blow over, but maybe not, and the danger for the GOP is that it could be a turnoff for swing voters ... and produce fractures within the party itself at a time it needs to have everybody pulling in the same direction," Levy said. 

Trump has been dismissive of both the uproar over the Epstein files and of negative polling surrounding the new law, asserting the massive package will help Republicans.

"Not one Democrat voted for us," Trump told an audience at a July 3 rally in Iowa to celebrate the bill's passage. "I think we use it in the campaign that's coming up, the midterms, because we've got to beat them."

New York State Democratic Committee Chairman Jay Jacobs said while Republicans may be hopeful the massive bill will boost their midterm chances, so too were Democrats when they passed a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package backed by President Joe Biden in 2021.

"All the touting in the world doesn’t necessarily yield favorable poll numbers," Jacobs said. "Just look at the infrastructure bill that Joe Biden passed. It didn’t help him at the polls, did it?"

By Laura Figueroa Hernandez

laura.figueroa@newsday.com@Laura_Figueroa

Laura Figueroa Hernandez is the White House correspondent and previously covered New York City politics and government. She joined Newsday in 2012 after covering state and local politics for The Miami Herald.